D. 27 - Charity

Division of the text

After the Master has determined about faith and hope, here, in the third place, he determines about charity.

This consideration is divided into two parts.

In the first, he considers the charity by which we love God, at Distinction 27;

in the second, the charity by which God loves us, at Distinction 32: to the above we must add [something] concerning the love of God by which he loves us. (Sent. III, 32.1(115).1.)

The first of these is divided into two parts.

In the first, he determines about charity itself;

in the second, the duration of charity, at Distinction 31: nor is it to be passed over that some assert that charity, once it is had by someone, cannot fall away. (Sent. III. 31. 1 (112). 1.)

The former is divided into two parts.

In the first, he considers the love of charity itself;

in the second, those things that are loved by charity, at Distinction 28: here it can be asked whether by that commandment of love of neighbor, we are commanded to love our whole neighbor, that is, soul and body, and our whole selves. (Sent. III. 28. 1 (104). 1.)

The first part is divided into three parts.

In the first, he makes a connection with preceding topics;

in the second, he pursues his intention, at charity is the love by which God is loved; (Sent. III. 27. 2 (97). 1.)

in the third, he connects it with the following topics, at but now let us inquire what things are to be loved by this love. (Sent. III. 27. 8 (103). 1.)

The second of these parts is divided into two parts.

In the first, he considers the love of charity as it is commanded by the two commandments [love of God and love of neighbor];

in the second, he shows that these two commandments mutually include one other, at because there are two precepts of charity, the one is often posed for the other. (Sent. III. 27. 7 (102). 1, citing Augustine, On the Trinity (CCSL 50), bk. 8, ch. 7, ln. 11.)

The first of these is divided into two parts.

In the first, he considers the love of charity according to which we are commanded by two commandments to love two, namely God and neighbor;

in the second he looks into the mode of love with respect to each object of love, at we must next turn to the manner of each love. (Sent. III, 27.5(100).1.)

Concerning the first, he does two things.

First, he shows that God and neighbor are loved by charity;

second, he shows that they are loved by the same charity, at here it is asked whether God is loved by the same love as our neighbor. (Sent. III, 27.3(98).1.)

We must next turn to the manner of each love. Here he shows the manner of this love:

first, as to love of neighbor;

second, as to love of God, at the manner of loving God is indicated by the words, 'with your whole heart.' (Sent. III, 27.5(100).4.)

And concerning this topic, he does three things.

First, he shows the manner of our love with respect to God;

second, he shows where that manner can be observed, at: and that precept is not wholly fulfilled by man in this mortal life; (Sent. III, 27.6(101).1.)

third, he raises a certain question, at: 'but why is such perfection commanded to man?' (Sent. III, 27.6(101).2, citing Augustine, De perfectione iustitiae hominis (CSEL 42), ch. 8, para. 19, p. 18.)

Here we will treat three questions:

first, about love in general; (Q. 1.)

second, about charity; (Q. 2.)

third, about the act and mode of charity. (Q. 3.)

Question 1

Love

Regarding the first, four things are to be asked:

first, what love is;

second, in what it exists;

third, how it compares to the soul’s other affections;

fourth, how it compares to things that are in knowledge.

Article 1

Whether Dionysius’s definition of love is good in all of its aspects

To the first we proceed thus. (Parallels: ST I.20.1; I-II.28; In De divinis nominibus 4, lect. 12.) In On the Divine Names, Dionysius defines love thus: (Pseudo-Dionysius, On the Divine Names, ch. 4, n. 15 (PG 3:714).) Love is a unitive and concretive power or virtue, moving higher things to exercise providence for those having less, that is, their inferiors; further, moving coordinated things, that is, equals, to a communicative relationship with each other; and finally, moving subjects, that is, lower things, to turn themselves toward better things, that is, their superiors. But it seems that here love is unfittingly defined.

Obj. 1: For no passion is a virtue, as it says in the Ethics 2. (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 2.5, 1105b28.) But love is a passion. Therefore it is not a virtue.

Obj. 2: Furthermore, Augustine says (Augustine, Sermones ad populum, serm. 65A, para. 2 (CCSL 41; PL 37:1521); see also serm. 357.) that love is of something now had. But whatever is now had, is in a certain way united to oneself. Therefore love is not a unitive power, but one following upon union.

Obj. 3: Furthermore, something that is more preserved in unlikeness than in likeness does not have the force of uniting. But love is more preserved in unlikeness, for we see that artisans of the same art, for example, potters, quarrel with each other, but with other artisans they live peacefully. Similarly, an empty stomach loves the food that a full stomach abhors. Therefore love does not have the force of uniting.

Obj. 4: Furthermore, in the Celestial Hierarchy (Pseudo-Dionysius, Celestial Hierarchy, ch. 7, para. 1 (PG 3:206).) Dionysius includes piercing and burning among the properties of love, and melting, too, is included as love’s effect, as in the Song of Songs 5:6, my soul melted when he spoke. (For “melted” the RSV gives “failed me.”) In On the Divine Names, (Pseudo-Dionysius, On the Divine Names, ch. 4, n. 13 (PG 3:711).) Dionysius also sets down as an effect of love “ecstasy,” that is, being placed outside oneself. But all these things seem to pertain to division. The piercing is what divides by penetrating; the burning, what dissolves by exhalations. Melting, too, is a kind of division opposed to freezing. And anything that is placed outside itself is divided from itself. Therefore love is more a divisive force than a unitive one.

Obj. 5: Furthermore, as every concretion is a certain union, it was therefore superfluous to set down both “unitive” and “concretive” in the definition of love.

Obj. 6: Furthermore, love is a passion. But it does not belong to passion to move, but rather to be an effect of motion and action. Therefore love is not something moving superiors, as he says.

Obj. 7: Furthermore, it is from their proper forms that superiors are inclined to act upon inferiors. But by acting upon them they provide for them. Hence, to move higher things to provide for their inferiors does not belong to love, but to nature.

Obj. 8: Furthermore, everything that communicates something to something else is given preference to the recipient. Therefore it does not belong to equals to share mutually with each other through love.

Obj. 9: Furthermore, everything that is done from love proceeds from an intrinsic principle, since what is done from love is voluntary. But the turning of inferiors toward superiors is from an extrinsic principle, namely, from the very action of the superiors by which they assimilate the inferiors to themselves. Therefore love does not turn inferiors toward superiors.

I answer that love pertains to appetite. Appetite, however, is a passive power. This is why in On the Soul 3 the Philosopher says (Aristotle, On the Soul 3.10, 433b15–20; Aquinas, Sent. De anima, bk. 3, lect. 15, n. 831.) what is desirable moves like an unmoved mover, whereas desire moves as a moved mover. Now, every passive principle is brought to perfection insofar as it is formed by the form of its corresponding active principle, and in this [active principle, through being so informed,] its motion reaches its terminus, and it comes to a rest. We see this in the case of intellect: before it is formed by an intelligible form, it inquires and doubts, but as soon as it is so informed, its inquiry ceases and the intellect fastens upon that, and then the intellect is said to adhere firmly to that thing. Similarly, when the affection or appetite is wholly imbued by the form of a good that is an object for it, it finds the good suitable, and adheres to it as though fixed upon it; and then it is said to love it. Whence love is nothing other than a certain transformation of affection into the thing loved.

And since anything that is made the form of something is made one with it, through love the lover becomes one with what is loved, which becomes the lover’s form. And therefore the Philosopher says in the Ethics 9 that a friend is another self; (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 9.4, 1166a32.) and we read in 1 Corinthians 6:17: anyone united to the Lord becomes one spirit with him. Now, each thing acts according to the demands and needs of its form, which is the principle of acting and the rule of work. But the good loved is the end, and the end is the starting-point in matters of action, as first principles are the starting-point in matters of knowledge. Whence, just as the intellect, once it is informed by the essences of things, is directed thereby to the knowledge of the principles, which principles become known once the terms are known, and is directed further to the knowledge of conclusions that come to be known from the principles, so too, the lover whose affection is informed by the good itself—which has the notion of an end, though not always of the last end—is inclined through love to act according to the demands and needs of the beloved, and such activity is most of all delightful to him, as being suitable to his form. For this reason, whatsoever the lover does or suffers for the beloved, the whole of it is delightful to him, and he is ever more stirred up, insofar as he experiences greater delight in the beloved in all he does or suffers for his sake. And just as fire cannot be restrained, except by violence, from the motion that suits it according to the requirements of its form, so neither can the lover be restrained from acting according to love; and on account of this, Gregory says that love cannot be lazy, but rather, if it exists at all, it accomplishes great things. (Gregory the Great, Homiliae in evangelia, bk. 2, serm. 30, para. 2 (CCSL 141; PL 76:1221).)

And since every violent thing is saddening, as if repugnant to the will, as it says in the Metaphysics 5, (Aristotle, Metaphysics 5.5, 1015a28; Aquinas, In Metaph., bk. 5, lect. 6, nn. 829–30.) it is therefore painful to work against love’s inclination, or even to disregard it, whereas to work according to it is to accomplish those things that are suitable for the beloved. For since the lover takes up the beloved as though he were the same as himself, he must, as it were, act as though he were the beloved in all that regards the beloved. And so, in a way, the lover serves the beloved insofar as he is guided by the beloved’s ends.

Accordingly, Dionysius, in the passage cited above, furnishes a most complete definition of love. For where he says that love is a unitive and concretive power, (Pseudo-Dionysius, On the Divine Names, ch. 4, n. 15 (PG 3:714).) he sets down the very union between lover and beloved, which comes about through the transformation of the lover’s affection into the beloved; and where he says moving superior things, he sets down love’s inclination to accomplish those things that regard the beloved, whether the beloved be a superior, an inferior, or an equal.

Reply Obj. 1: The word “virtue” is not used here to refer to a habit, as in the Ethics 2, (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 2.5, 1105b25.) but more broadly, for anything that can be the principle of some activity or motion. And since love brings about an inclination to activity, as was said, therefore Dionysius calls love a virtue.

Reply Obj. 2: Love is said to be “of something already had” as that which is formed already has its form. But this formation is preceded by the desire that tends toward being formed, as reason precedes understanding or knowledge, and so [from the vantage of desire] love is said to be of something not had. Whence love is called a unitive power formally, since it is the very union or connection or transformation by which the lover is transformed into the beloved and in a way is turned into him. Or it may be said that the quieting of affection suggested by the word “love” can only exist when two are found to be suited for each other, a fittingness that follows the extent of the participation of the one in that which belongs to the other, and in this way, the lover in a sense has the beloved. Whence the conjunction implied in “to have” is the conjunction of thing to thing, and this is preceded by the union of thing to affection, which is love.

Reply Obj. 3: The root of love, speaking of its essential meaning, is the likeness of the beloved to the lover, since it is owing to such a likeness that the beloved is good and suitable for him. But it happens incidentally that unlikeness can be a cause of love and likeness a cause of hate, and this, in three ways.

In one way, when the affection of the lover is not at rest within itself, nor at rest in his condition or one of his qualities, as when someone hates something in himself. And then it behooves him to love someone else who, in that respect, is unlike himself, since from the very fact that the other is unlike him in condition, he is made like to his affection, and, conversely, he hates whatever is like him and is not made like to his affection.

In a second way, this happens when someone who loves something is prevented from enjoying what he loves owing to that likeness [between himself and another possessor], and this occurs in regard to everything which cannot be possessed simultaneously by many, such as temporal things. Whence the one who loves to get profit or delight from a thing is impeded from the enjoyment of what he loves by another who similarly wishes to appropriate that thing to himself. And here is the source of jealousy, which does not allow any sharing of what is loved, and envy, inasmuch as the good of another is judged an impediment to one’s own good.

In a third way, this happens when an unlikeness that comes before causes one to perceive more keenly a love that comes afterwards. For since we sense precisely when the sense-power is moved, which motion ceases when the sensible is now made the form of the power sensing, we do not perceive those things to which we have grown accustomed, as is evident with a builder whose ears are full of the sound of hammers. And it is for this reason that love is felt more keenly when the affection has been newly transformed into the beloved by the force of love. Hence, when someone does not have the beloved really present, he or she burns for the beloved and is in dire straits, for the love is then more keenly perceived, although in the beloved’s presence, love is not less, but only less perceived. Thus Augustine says, love is not felt when need does not produce it, since what is loved is always available. (Augustine, On the Trinity, bk. 10, ch. 12 (CCSL 50A; PL 42:984).)

Reply Obj. 4: In love there is a union of lover and beloved, but there is also a threefold division. For by the fact that love transforms the lover into the beloved, it makes the lover enter into the interior of the beloved and vice versa, so that nothing of the beloved remains not united to the lover, just as a form reaches to the innermost recesses of that which it informs and vice versa. Thus, the lover in a way penetrates into the beloved, and so love is called “piercing”; for to come into the innermost recesses of a thing by dividing it is characteristic of something piercing. In the same way does the beloved penetrate the lover, reaching to his innermost recesses, and that is why it is said that love “wounds,” and that it “transfixes the innards.” But because nothing can be transformed into another without withdrawing, in a way, from its own form, since of a single thing there is a single form, therefore preceding this division of penetration is another division by which the lover, in tending toward the beloved, is separated from himself. And according to this, love is said to bring about ecstasy and to burn, since that which burns rises beyond itself and vanishes into smoke. Further still, because nothing withdraws from itself unless it is unbound from what was containing it within itself, as a natural thing does not lose its form unless the dispositions retaining this form in the matter are unbound, it is therefore necessary that that boundedness by which the lover was contained within his own bounds be taken away from him. And that is why love is said to “melt the heart,” for a liquid is not contained by its own limits, while the contrary disposition is called “hardness of heart.”

Reply Obj. 5: Union is twofold. For a certain kind of union unifies [only] in a qualified sense, like the union of things brought together by their surfaces touching; and such is not the union of love, since, as was said, the lover is transformed into the inner identity of the beloved. There is another union that unifies simply speaking, like the union of continuous things and of form and matter; and such is the union of love, since love makes the beloved the lover’s form. Thus, in addition to “union” Dionysius adds “concretion,” in order to differentiate it from the first union, since those things are called “thoroughly mingled” which are made to be simply one. Accordingly, another version gives "continuative." (To be sure the letter of Scotus Erigena reads unitivam quandam et continuativam (PL 122:1137); Τὸν ἔρωτα... ἑνωτικήν τινα καὶ συγκρατικήν ἐννοήσωμεν δύναμιν... thus is read in the text of Dionysius. (PG 3:713B).)

Reply Obj. 6: Appetite, as was said, moves while being moved. Thus passion, since it is moved by what is loved, moves in keeping with the demands and needs of what is loved.

Reply Obj. 7: The very inclination of superiors to provide for inferiors, which is in them owing to their proper forms, is called their love, as will be evident below. (In the reply to objection 9.)

Reply Obj. 8: Among things which are equal simply speaking, it is not unfitting that one be greater than another, in precisely that respect in which one is needed by the other.

Reply Obj. 9: The being-turned by which inferiors are turned toward superiors is their being-ordered to an end intended by the superiors. And although the principle of this kind of being ordered is from without insofar as the inferiors are ordered by those superiors to the ends of the superiors, nevertheless it is from an intrinsic principle insofar as there is a certain inclination to this in the inferiors themselves, whether from nature, as in natural love, or from the will, as in animal love. And it is on account of this that God is said to “dispose all things sweetly,” insofar as singular things of themselves do that to which they are ordered.

Article 2

Whether love is only in the concupiscible power

To the second we proceed thus. (Parallels: above, d. 26, q. 2, a. 1; ST I-II.26.1.) It seems that love is not only in the concupiscible power.

Obj. 1: For Dionysius, in On the Divine Names, sets down four kinds of love: divine, angelic, intellectual, and natural. (Pseudo-Dionysius, On the Divine Names, ch. 4, n. 15 (PG 3:714).) But whatever is in us pertains to intellect, to animality, or to nature. Hence love may be found in all the things that are in us.

Obj. 2: Furthermore, the Commentator there (Averroes, Commentary on On the Divine Names, ch. 4.) sets down two definitions of love. The first is this: love is the connection or chain by which the totality of all things is joined together in ineffable friendship and indissoluble unity. The second is: love is the end and quiet resting place of the natural motion of all things that are in motion, beyond which no motion of the creature extends. From these things it may be gathered that love is found in all things. Love, therefore, is in all the things that are in us, be they parts of the soul or parts of the body.

Obj. 3: Furthermore, every power takes delight in being joined with what is fitting to it. But delight is only taken in something loved. Thus, in any power whatsoever exists a love for what is fitting to it.

Obj. 4: Furthermore, as was said in the preceding article, and as can be gathered from the definition just mentioned, love is the end and quieting of appetitive motion. But within any power of ours is a desire for its proper good, and it tends toward this. Thus, love may be found in any power.

Obj. 5: Furthermore, at very least, the irascible power, too, pertains to the appetitive part. But the universal object of the appetitive part is the good. Since, therefore, love is always of some good, it seems that love is not only in the concupiscible power but also in the irascible power.

On the contrary, the Philosopher says in the Topics 2 (Aristotle, Topics 2.7, 113b2.) that love is in the concupiscible power.

Furthermore, the order found among parts of the soul corresponds to the order found among parts of the body. But among parts of the body, a single member can exercise a function that has regard to all the other members, as the foot carries not only itself but all the other members. [So too, among parts of the soul,] the concupiscible power desires and loves not only for itself but for all the others; and thus, the love of things pertaining to all powers seems to be in the concupiscible power.

Furthermore, there is love only for something known. If, therefore, love of the proper good were in all powers, by the same reasoning knowledge of the proper good would also be in all of them—which is false.

Furthermore, the object of the concupiscible power is a good befitting the one desiring, absolutely speaking. But whatever is good in terms of any power is fitting to the one desiring. Therefore to desire the good of any power pertains to the concupiscible power, and for the same reason, pertains to love; and thus, love will only exist in the concupiscible power.

Proof of the major premise: if the object of the concupiscible power were not a good befitting the one desiring, simply speaking, its object would be the good fitting only to the concupiscible power. But a good is fitting to any power by comparison with its specific act, as the good fitting to sight is that which is good for seeing. On this view, therefore, the object of the concupiscible power would be good under the aspect of “good for desiring.”

But this is impossible. To desire “what is good for desiring” happens in the wake of the concupiscible power’s turning back upon its own act, insofar as it desires itself to desire or to desire well. That for which something is good is desired first, since it is the end. But the turning back of a power upon its own act is preceded naturally by the simple act of the same power directly tending toward its object, as I first see color before I see myself seeing. The object of the concupiscible power cannot, therefore, be something tended toward under the aspect of “good for desiring,” since to desire this would be naturally both prior and posterior to the turning back of the concupiscible power upon its own act, which is impossible.

Therefore it is necessary to give another account—namely, that the object of the concupiscible power is a good befitting the one desiring, absolutely speaking.

I answer that everything in pursuit of an end has to be determined to that end in some way, for otherwise it would not arrive at one end more than at any other. But such a determination has to emerge from an intention of the end—not merely out of nature tending to an end, since if that were true, all things would be by chance, as certain philosophers have claimed. But to intend an end is impossible unless the end is known precisely as end, and the relationship between things that are toward the end [the means] and the end itself is also known. Now, the one who knows an end and things that are toward the end directs not only himself but also other things to that end, as the archer shoots an arrow at a target.

So, therefore, something tends to an end in two ways. In one way, as directed of itself to an end, which only happens in one who knows the end and the notion of the end. In another way, as directed by another; and in this way all things, in accord with their natures, tend to their proper and natural ends, as directed by the wisdom which established nature. We find two corresponding appetites: the natural appetite, which is nothing other than a thing’s inclination to its natural end—an inclination given by the direction of the one who established nature; and a voluntary appetite, which is the inclination of one who knows an end and the ordering of things toward that end. Between these two there is a middle appetite, which proceeds from knowledge of an end, yet lacks knowledge of the notion of end and the relationship between the end and things that are toward the end; and this is the sensitive appetite. These two kinds of appetite, sensitive and voluntary, are found only in natures to which living and knowing belong.

Now, all that is proper to the nature of a living thing has to be led back to some power of the soul in the one that has a soul. Hence, there must be one power of the soul to which seeking after belongs, contradistinguished from that power to which knowing belongs, even as separated substances, too, are divided into intellect and will, as philosophers say. It is therefore clear that natural appetite differs from voluntary appetite in this respect: the natural appetite’s inclination is derived from an extrinsic principle and so it has no freedom, since “the free” may be defined as “that which is its own cause”; whereas the voluntary appetite’s inclination is from the very one willing, and thus the will has freedom.

But the sensitive appetite’s inclination is partly from the one desiring, inasmuch as it follows upon apprehension of an appetible, hence, Augustine says that animals are moved by what they see, and partly from another, inasmuch as they lack knowledge of the ordering to an end; and owing to this, it is necessary that things useful for the end be provided to them by another who knows [what is useful for the end]. Hence, they are moved toward such things by a natural inclination. On account of this, they do not have freedom in the full sense, but they do partake of some aspects of freedom. Now, everything which is from God receives from him a nature by which it is ordered to its ultimate end. Hence, natural appetite will be found, of necessity, in all created things directed to ends—even in the will itself, with respect to its ultimate end. Hence, by natural appetite, a person wills happiness as well as those things that concern the very nature of the will. Thus, it should be said that natural appetite exists in every power of the soul and in the parts of the body with respect to the proper good [of each power or part], but animal appetite, which is of a determinate good to which nature’s inclination does not suffice, belongs to some determinate power—either the will, the concupiscible power, or the irascible power.

And thence it is that all the other powers of the soul are compelled by their objects, except for the will, since all the others have only a natural appetite with respect to their objects, whereas the will has, beyond its natural inclination, another of which the very one who wills is the cause. And one should speak in a similar way about love, which is the termination of appetitive motion, since natural love is in all powers and in all things, while animal love, if I may so put it, is in some determinate power—either in the will, insofar as this refers to the termination of the appetite of the intellective part, or in the concupiscible power, insofar as this refers to the termination of the sensitive appetite.

Reply Obj. 1: Dionysius takes “love” as a common term, applicable to natural love, sensitive love, which he calls “animal,” and intellective love, which he calls “intellectual” as far as men are concerned, “angelic and divine” as far as separate substances are concerned. And he sets down these five, because there cannot be more levels of appetite: in God there is voluntary appetite only, for he determines all things and is not determined by anything; in angels, there is the voluntary with the natural, inasmuch as they are determined by God to the willing of something by nature; in man, the voluntary with the sensitive and the natural; in animals, the sensitive with the natural; and in other things, the natural only.

Reply Obj. 2: The Commentator, in the passage cited, defines love insofar as it may be applied to all things in common.

Reply Obj. 3: Delight is caused by the conjunction of a suitable [good], for a suitable good, when it comes, perfects the one to which it comes, and gives rest to that one’s inclination; and this being-at-rest, insofar as it is perceived, is delight. (Or "pleasure.") For this reason Plato said (See Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 7.11, 1152b13; 10.2, 1172b28.) that delight is a sensible generation into one’s nature, that is, a perceived emergence into what is connatural. Whence delight in no way exists in things that do not have knowledge. For beings with knowledge, however, there are two inclinations to whatever is fitting: natural appetite and animal appetite. Each of these inclinations is given rest when its object is present, and in each case the being-at-rest is perceived, too, so that delight is caused on both accounts. The delight, or pleasure, that is the being-at-rest of natural appetite is therefore found [to occur] in every power when its appropriate object is joined with it, whereas the delight that is the being-at-rest of animal appetite only arises in the concupiscible power or in the will. If one is speaking with precision, the former delight is only called “delight” (Or "pleasure.") and the opposite passion, “pain.” But the latter delight has in addition the name “joy,” and the opposite passion is called “sadness.” Whence, while pleasure and pain are in some way in all powers of the soul, joy and sadness are only in the concupiscible power or in the will.

Reply Obj. 4: One should reply to this as to the first, since the argument is based on natural appetite.

Reply Obj. 5: Animal love does not pertain to the irascible power, since the object of love is a good, as such—not a good under the aspect of being, in addition, arduous or difficult, which sort of good is the proper object of the irascible power.

Article 3

Whether love is the first and foremost affection of the soul

To the third we proceed thus. (Parallels: ST I.20.1; I-II.25.2; 27.4; SCG III.19; De veritate, q. 26, a. 4; De spe, a. 3; In De divinis nominibus 4, lect. 9.) It seems that love is not first and foremost among all the affections of the soul.

Obj. 1: For motion toward a terminus precedes the latter. But it is love that gives a terminus to appetitive motion, as is clear from things said. (Above, a. 1.) Therefore desire, which brings about appetitive motion, precedes love, which has reference to the terminus.

Obj. 2: Furthermore, that due to which anything is such as it is, is even more so itself. (Aristotle, Posterior Analytics 1.2, 72a29; Aquinas, Post. Anal., bk. 1, lect. 6, n. 3.) But delight is a cause of love, which explains why a kind of friendship is founded upon the pleasurable. Therefore the affection of delight is more fundamental than love.

Obj. 3: Furthermore, Augustine says in Eighty-Three Questions: there is no one who does not flee pain more than he desires pleasure. (Augustine, De diuersis quaestionibus octoginta tribus, q. 36, n. 1 (CCSL 44A; PL 40:25).) But flight from pain causes hatred, just as desire for delight causes love. Therefore hatred is a more vehement passion than love.

Obj. 4: Furthermore, that which is conquered by another is less powerful. But love is conquered by anger, since anger gives birth to hatred, as Augustine says. Therefore anger is a more vehement passion than love.

Obj. 5: Furthermore, that for the sake of which things do whatsoever they do is most efficacious of all. But as Dionysius says in On the Divine Names, (Pseudo-Dionysius, On the Divine Names, ch. 11, n. 1 (PG 3:947).) it is for the sake of peace that things do whatsoever they do. Among all affections, therefore, peace is the most efficacious, even with respect to love.

On the contrary, Augustine says (Augustine, The City of God, bk. 14, ch. 9, n. 1 (CCSL 48; PL 41:413).) that every affection is from love.

Furthermore, good is the object of affection. But that which first concerns the good is love. Therefore love is the principle of the whole of affection, and the foremost passion.

Furthermore, love is compared to fire and even to death, as is clear from the Song of Songs 8:6. But nothing is more vehement than these. No passion, therefore, is more vehement than love.

Furthermore, Chrystostom says: great is love, nor is there anything which can resist its impetus. (John Chrysostom, source
)

I answer that love stands first among the soul’s affections. For love bespeaks the giving of a definite term to the power of affection, by way of affection’s being informed by its object.

Now, the following is found to be true in all matters: motion proceeds from a first unmoving thing at rest. This is evident in natural things, since the first mover in any genus is not moved in regard to that genus of motion, as the first cause of alteration is not itself altered. The same likewise holds for intellectual things, since the motion of discursive reason proceeds from the [unchanging] principles of things and what they are, by which the intellect, having been informed thereby, is determined.

Since therefore affection is informed by love and made determinate by love, as the intellect by principles and what things are, as was just said, every affective motion must proceed from the love’s being at rest and becoming determinate. And since everything that is first in any genus is more perfect—as is the understanding of principles in the realm of demonstrable things, and the motion of the heavens in the realm of natural things—it is therefore necessary that love be more vehement than the other affections, as will be evident by going through them one by one.

Reply Obj. 1: As in the operation of intellect a sort of circle is brought to completion, so also in the operation of affection. Starting from the certitude of the principles to which it immovably assents, intellect proceeds, by reasoning, to conclusions, in the knowledge of which it rests with greater certitude to the extent that those conclusions are resolved back into the first principles whose power is manifested in them.

Likewise, too, from love of an end—which is, as it were, the principle—affection proceeds, by way of desiring, to those things which are toward the end [that is, the “means”], in which things it can rest through love to the extent that it takes them as containing the end in some manner. And so, desire follows upon love of an end, although it precedes love of things which are toward the end. Love, too, is a more vehement affection than desire insofar as it bespeaks the bounding and forming of affection by the appetible object, to which desire is [then] moved.

Reply Obj. 2: Love naturally precedes delight, for delight comes about from a thing’s being joined to something really suited for it, whereas love makes what is loved to be suitable and as if connatural to the lover, insofar as it unites the lover’s affection to the loved, as was said. And so, delight arises from the real presence of the loved. But since the delightful, too, can be loved as a certain good, it thus happens per accidens that a love may be caused by delight, as an act may be caused by an object or an end; for the one who loves something for the sake of the delight chiefly loves delight itself.

Accordingly, although a certain delight, or pleasure, may be prior to a certain love, simply speaking love is prior to pleasure. Similarly, love is more vehement, since it comes about through the informing of the appetite by something appetible, whereas pleasure, or delight, comes about when a thing is joined to something suitable and present to it. But the joining of thing to thing is not the same as the joining of appetite to appetible. The thing that causes pleasure upon its arrival is not joined [to the one pleased by it] according to nature, for this does not become that. Hence, in this case there is a joining in the manner of contact. Appetite, in contrast, is of and toward the appetible itself, according to its nature and substance. Hence, when an appetite is informed by something appetible, it is a joining in the manner of continuity and concretion. For this reason love unites more than pleasure does, since it makes the lover to be, in his affection, the very one loved, whereas pleasure comes about when the lover shares in something that belongs to the loved, insofar as the one loved is really present. Yet it should be understood that when the one loved is really present, in the manner in which this is possible, pleasure then occurs, as from the joining of what is most of all fitting [to the lover]. When, on the other hand, the one loved is altogether absent in reality, then the lover is most of all afflicted by the one loved, even as pain may accompany the cutting apart of something continuous, for love is a force that makes for continuity, as was said; and this is why it is said that “love makes one grow faint and waste away.” But when the one loved is in one respect present and in another respect absent, the lover experiences pleasure mingled with affliction.

Reply Obj. 3: What is good is more vehement in acting than what is evil, since good does not necessarily have evil mixed up with it, whereas evil necessarily has good mixed up with it. Again, what is good acts by its own power, but what is evil acts by the power of the good [mixed up with it], as Dionysius says in On the Divine Names. (Pseudo-Dionysius, On the Divine Names, ch. 4, nn. 31, 32 (PG 3:731).) Hence, what is good is more loved than the evil opposed to it is hated.

Nevertheless, bodily pains are more evil than certain pleasures are good, since the pleasure of which Augustine is speaking in that passage comes about when a secondary perfection is added to the animal, as occurs in eating food or engaging in sexual intercourse, whereas the sadness or pain owing to which such a pleasure is abandoned comes about from the removal of a primary perfection pertaining to a thing’s very being, as when something continuous is cut into pieces. Accordingly, if [instead of the sadness resulting from threats to life,] the sadness contrary to that sensual pleasure were considered, the pleasure would be more desired than the corresponding sadness would be fled, even as someone seeks pleasure in food, even if afterward he may suffer sadness from the food’s being taken away, or something of this sort.

Reply Obj. 4: Love is prior to anger and more vehement, for anger is caused by sadness, as was said earlier, (Above: d. 26, q. 1, a. 3, resp.) even as all the irascible passions are caused by concupiscible passions. And since love is prior to and more vehement than the other concupiscible passions, it will be prior to and more vehement than the irascible passions. Yet even though anger gives birth to hatred, still it does not destroy love; rather, anger comes after the destruction of love, since appetite cannot be moved to the point of harming something unless beforehand one’s feelings toward the object had been distanced from love.

Reply Obj. 5: Peace is not distinct from love, but is something of love, for it bespeaks the resting, as it were, of the appetite [in what is loved]. Love, in addition to this, bespeaks the lover’s transformation into, and his turning toward, the one loved. Thus peace is a mean between desire and love.

Article 4

Whether knowledge is higher than love

To the fourth we proceed thus. (Parallel: ST I-II.3.4.ad 4.) It seems that knowledge is higher than love.

Obj. 1: The highest act is that of the highest power. But the intellect is the highest power in us, as the Philosopher says in the Ethics 10. (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 10.7, 1177a13-20.) Therefore knowledge is the highest operation of the powers within us, and so it is worthier than love.

Obj. 2: Furthermore, as Boethius says, (Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy, bk. 3, prose 10 (CCSL 94; PL 63:765).) nature takes its origin from perfect things. But knowledge precedes love. Therefore knowledge is higher than love.

Obj. 3: Furthermore, what is proper to a human being is nobler than what he has in common with brute animals. But understanding is proper to humans, while humans and animals share in having love. Therefore knowledge and understanding are worthier than love.

Obj. 4: Furthermore, the contemplative life is nobler and higher than the active life. But knowledge pertains to the contemplative life, whereas love seems to pertain to practice, since its object is the good. Therefore knowledge is higher than love.

Obj. 5: Furthermore, the object of love is the good as such, but the true is better than the good as such, since the true is highest in the genus of goods, even as the best human being is better than a human as such. Therefore knowledge is higher than love.

Obj. 6: Furthermore, something is higher to the extent that it is more spiritual. But knowledge is more spiritual than love, since knowledge concerns a sort of movement from things toward the soul, whereas love concerns a sort of movement from the soul to things. Therefore knowledge is more noble than love.

Obj. 7: Furthermore, a reward has pre-eminence to that which merits it. But knowledge is the reward of love, according to John 14:21: those who love me will be loved by my Father, and I will love them and reveal myself to them. And Augustine says that vision is the whole reward. (Augustine, Enarrationes in Psalmos, Ps 90, serm. 2, para. 13 (CCSL 39; PL 37:1170).) Therefore knowledge is more eminent than love.

On the contrary (8), Ephesians 3:19 speaks of the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.

Furthermore (9), 1 Corinthians 13:13 says that charity is greater than faith. Thus, for the same reason, any love is greater and worthier than the knowledge corresponding to it.

Furthermore (10), Hugh of St. Victor—commenting on Dionysius’s words mobile and piercing—says, love surpasses knowledge and is greater than understanding, for more is loved than is understood, and love enters in where knowledge remains without. (Hugh of Saint Victor, Super Hierarchiam Dionysii (D. Poirel, 2015), bk. 6, ch. 6, para. 1 (CCCM 178:560; PL 175:1038).) Therefore love exceeds knowledge.

Furthermore (11), in all things the end is most powerful. But the object of love is the good, which has the notion of an end. Therefore, since activities are distinguished entirely by their objects, love is the most powerful among all the soul’s activities.

Furthermore (12), as power is to power, so is activity to activity. But the will is higher than all the other powers of the soul, since it moves all the others and is not subject to compulsion. Therefore love, which is an activity of the will, surpasses all the other activities of the soul.

Furthermore (13), as Dionysius says, (Pseudo-Dionysius, On the Divine Names, ch. 5 (PG 3:815).) that which is found in more is simpler and nobler, as being is nobler than living, although living things are nobler than things that merely exist, insofar as living things participate more nobly in being. But love is participated in by more things than knowledge, since, as was said in the preceding article, in all things there is love in some way, but not knowledge. Therefore love stands before knowledge. For instance, it would be ridiculous to say that in stones there is a natural knowledge, even as there is love or a natural appetite.

I answer that a twofold perfection is found in all things: one, by which a thing subsists in itself; another, by which it is ordered to other things.

Each of these perfections in material things is finite and determined, because a material thing has one determinate form through which it belongs to one species only, and also has an inclination and order, through a determinate power, to certain things proportioned to it, such as heavy things in relation to the center. In regard to both perfections, however, immaterial things possess infinity, in a way, because they are, in a way, all things—either so far as the essence of an immaterial thing is an exemplar and likeness of all things, as happens in God, or so far as it has actually or potentially the likenesses of all things, as happens in angels and souls; and it is from this vantage that knowledge belongs to them. In like manner, too, they have an inclination and order to all things, and it is from this vantage that will belongs to them, through which they are actually or potentially pleased or displeased by all things. And to the extent that they participate in immateriality, they are made participants of knowledge and will. This is the reason why even animals may be said to know, for the species of sensible things are immaterially received in their organs of sense, and—in accord with intentions spiritually gleaned from things—the animals are then inclined, by their sensitive appetite, toward various things.

It is evident, therefore, that knowledge pertains to the perfection of the knower [and is that] by which he is made perfect in himself, whereas the will pertains to a thing’s perfection as regards its order to other things. And so, the object of the knowing power is the true, which exists in the soul, as the Philosopher says in the Metaphysics 6, (Aristotle, Metaphysics 6.4, 1027b18–25.) while the object of the appetitive power is the good, which exists in things, as is said in the same place.

The knowing power can thus be compared to the appetitive power in three ways. First, according to their order: and in this way the knowing power is naturally prior, because the perfection of a thing in itself is prior to the perfection it has by being ordered to another. Second, with respect to their capacity: and in this way they are equal, because just as the knowing power has some relation to all things, so too has the appetitive. For this reason they mutually include each other: intellect knows the will, and the will has appetite for or loves what pertains to intellect. Third, they can be compared according to eminence or dignity: and in this way they are related as exceeding and exceeded. For, if intellect and will and the things that pertain to them be considered as properties and accidents of that being in which they exist, intellect is pre-eminent, along with what pertains to it. If, on the other hand, they be considered as powers—that is, according to the order they have to acts and objects—the will takes precedence, along with what pertains to it.

But if it be asked which of these is worthier simply speaking, it should be said, to begin the answer, that there are things superior to the soul and things inferior to it. Accordingly, since through willing and loving person is, in a way, drawn into the very things willed and loved, whereas through knowledge, on the contrary, things known are made to be in the knower by way of their likenesses, it follows that with respect to things above the soul, love is nobler and higher than knowledge, but with respect to things below the soul, knowledge is preferable. And this holds of evil things, too, for loving them is bad, but knowing them is good.

Reply Obj. 1: The Philosopher speaks there of powers insofar as they are properties of that in which they are. An alternative explanation would be that for the Philosopher the term “intellect” embraces both the intellect and the will corresponding to it, as also the term “reason” at times embraces both reason and will. Therefore, one should not see in this passage a comparison of intellect to will, but rather of intellectual powers to inferior powers.

Reply Obj. 2: While the first principle in any genus is most perfect, still it need not be the case that everything which is prior be more perfect, given that something can be prior in the way of generation which is less perfect than what will result in time, as a boy is less perfect than a man, and the one learning a science than the one who knows it. And thus, too, does knowledge take precedence, in a way, over love.

Reply Obj. 3: That argument holds concerning intellect and will only with respect to the being in which they exist. An alternative explanation would be that the other animals participate in intellect in some way, through a kind of obscure resonance, inasmuch as they have powers of sensing, just as they participate in will inasmuch as they have sensual appetite—for which reason the “voluntary” is found in brute animals, as the Philosopher says in the Ethics 3, (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 3.2, 1111b8.) though they do not have will properly speaking.

Reply Obj. 4: Will and love are not excluded from the contemplative life, as neither is intellect from the active life; and therefore the ranking cannot be established according to the ranking of the two lives.

Reply Obj. 5: A particular only has the notion and nature of the universal [under which it is belongs] to the extent that the universal nature is found in it. Hence, it is impossible that a universal notion be more present in a particular than in the universal itself, although the notion of something else might be found more in a particular than in the universal. For example, a human cannot be more of an animal than animal in common, but he can be more good, or something of this sort. And so, neither the true nor any good, taken as a particular, can be said to be more eminent than the good itself.

Reply Obj. 6: That argument holds concerning things below the soul, and therefore less spiritual than it.

Reply Obj. 7: Although the beatific vision will not be lacking love in the content of the reward, as neither in the gaining of merit was the wayfarer’s love altogether lacking in knowledge of God, nevertheless, the reward is assigned more to knowledge and the meriting more to love, because reward has to do with a receiving by which someone is perfected in himself, while merit has to do with the activity by which someone stretches out toward the one who will reward him, and joins himself to him.

Reply Sed Contra 8–9: And since it is necessary also to respond to the other points that have been raised, it should be said that those arguments follow concerning the soul’s knowledge of God, who is above the soul; hence, loving him is better than knowing him.

Reply Sed Contra 10: Love enters more into a thing than knowledge, since knowledge is of the known insofar as it is received in the knower’s capacity, whereas love is of the loved in a different way, the lover himself being transformed into the very thing loved, as was said before. Thus, it was stated that will exceeds knowledge as regards the way in which the soul is perfected in its order to other things, to which way it pertains to be more or less intimate with a thing.

Reply Sed Contra 11: The notion of end properly concerns motion and activity and the order something has to an end, and not the very being of a thing, absolutely speaking. Hence, in mathematics, where there is neither activity nor motion, no finality is to be found, as is said in the Metaphysics 3. (Aristotle, Metaphysics 3.2, 996a29; Aquinas, In Metaph., bk. 3, lect. 4, nn. 374–75.) Thus, the argument given in the objection is valid when taken according to the way in which will is said to be preeminent to intellect.

Reply Sed Contra 12: It pertains to the will to be the mover of other powers and not to be subject to compulsion by an object, insofar as the will is the first power that determines for other human powers their ordering to the various things in regard to which they act, and insofar as the will itself is not determined by another. Hence, to the extent that it is determined by a natural inclination implanted by God, in a way it does not have freedom, but is, as it were, compelled by this natural inclination—as with respect to happiness, which no one is able not to will. From this vantage, namely of man’s being ordered by another, it was admitted that love exceeds knowledge.

Reply Sed Contra 13: Love, properly speaking, only exists in things that are knowers ; but the term “love” is carried over to things to which the term “knowledge” cannot be extended. The reason for this is that love is spoken of whenever the one loving is ordered to another thing. Now, one thing can be ordered to another even when the ordering comes from an outside mover. Accordingly, the terms “love” and “appetite” can be given to things lacking knowledge, when they are ordered to something else by genuine knowers—and it is of these latter that love is properly said, insofar as they are ordered, in and of themselves, to what is loved. “Knowledge,” on the other hand, is spoken of whenever a thing known comes to be in the knower according to the knower’s mode—namely, according to spiritual and immaterial being. Yet such a disposition can only exist in anything owing to a property of its own nature. Hence, the term “knowledge” cannot be extended to things that do not have such a nature, as if one were to say that non-sensing things naturally “know,” as they naturally “love” or “desire.”

Question 2

Charity

Next, charity is asked about, and concerning it, we will inquire into four things:

first, what charity is;

second, whether it is a virtue;

third, what its subject in the soul is;

fourth, how it stands in comparison with other virtues.

Article 1

Whether charity is the same as concupiscence, or what is charity

To the first we proceed thus. (Parallels: ST I-II.65.5; II-II.23.1.) It seems that charity is the same as concupiscence.

Obj. 1: For Augustine says (Augustine, On Christian Doctrine, bk. 3, ch. 10 (CCSL 32; PL 34:72).) that charity is the virtue by which we desire to see and to enjoy God. But to desire and enjoy are acts of concupiscence. Therefore charity is concupiscence.

Obj. 2: Again, it seems that it is the same as love, because, as Dionysius says, rational love is the same as love; (Pseudo-Dionysius, On the Divine Names, ch. 4, n. 12 (PL 3:710).) but in the text of the Master it says: charity is the rational love by which God is loved for his own sake, and one’s neighbor for God’s sake. (Sent. III, 27.2(97).1.) Therefore charity is the same as love.

Obj. 3: Again, it seems that it is the same as benevolence. For it is owing to benevolence that we desire good things for someone, but charity does just this, since it desires eternal life both for oneself and for others, and this is why someone having charity is said to love his neighbor as himself. Therefore charity is the same as benevolence.

Obj. 4: Further, it seems that it is the same as concord. For charity causes the Church’s unity, which consists in all of us speaking the same thing and there being no divisions among you, as we read in 1 Corinthians 1:10. But this pertains to concord. Therefore charity is the same as concord.

Obj. 5: Further, it seems that it is the same as beneficence. For the measure of genuine charity is that we love not only in words, but in truth and action (1 John 3:18). But to demonstrate love by deeds pertains to beneficence. Therefore charity seems to be the same as beneficence.

Obj. 6: Further, it seems that it is the same as peace. For charity is the bond that makes for unity of spirits. But this is attributed to peace: making every effort to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace (Eph 4:3). Therefore charity is the same as peace.

Obj. 7: Further, it seems that it is the same as friendship, since, as the Philosopher says in the Ethics 9, (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 9.4, 1166b1.) friendship is likened to a superabundance of love. But charity has the most superabundant love, a fact that gives it its very name “charity” (caritas), for it esteems the beloved as the most cherished (carissima) thing, placed beyond all price. Therefore charity is the same as friendship.

On the contrary (8), as the Philosopher says, (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 8.3, 1156a8–20.) friendship exists between those who reciprocate their love. But charity exists even toward enemies. Therefore it is not the same as friendship.

Furthermore (9), friendship exists between people who live together and share in the same activities, whereas charity is directed toward God and the angels, whose manner of living and acting is not common to them and to us men. Therefore charity is not friendship.

Furthermore (10), friendship is not hidden from view, whereas charity is most of all hidden. It is therefore not friendship.

Furthermore (11), friendship seeks, above all, to talk with and to see a friend in person, as the Philosopher says. (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 9.11, 1171a27–b2.) But charity does not seek this, as Jerome says in his preface to the Bible. It is therefore not the same as friendship.

Furthermore (12), genuine friendship exists only among the few and the virtuous, whereas charity is toward all, even those who are evil. Therefore charity is not the same as friendship.

I answer that love is a certain resting of appetite, as was said above. (Above, q. 1, a. 1.) Hence, just as appetite is found in the sensitive and intellectual parts of the soul, so too is love. Now, while things that pertain to the sensitive appetite get transferred to the intellectual appetite, such as the names of the passions, what is proper to the intellectual appetite is not applicable to the sensitive appetite, such as the term “will.” And thus, love is found in each appetite. As found in the sensitive appetite, it is called “love” properly, for this implies a passion. As found in the intellectual part, it is called “rational love,” for this includes the element of choice, which pertains to the intellectual appetite. Nevertheless, though the term “love” gets transferred from the lower part to the higher, the term “rational love” never gets transferred from the higher part to the lower. All the other terms that seem to pertain to love either are included within these terms already, or include them, and add some distinctive note beyond what is signified by “rational love” or “love.”

For since love in a certain way unites lover to beloved, the lover therefore stands to the beloved as if to himself or to that which concerns his perfection. But to himself and to that which belongs to him, he stands in the following ways. First, he wishes whatever concerns his perfection to be present to him; and therefore love includes longing for the beloved, by which the beloved’s presence is desired. Second, in his affections a person turns other things back to himself and seeks for himself whatever goods are expedient for him; and so far as this is done for the beloved, love includes the benevolence by which someone desires good things for the beloved. Third, the things a person desires for himself he actually acquires for himself by acting; and insofar as this activity is exercised toward another, love includes beneficence. Fourth, to the accomplishment of whatever seems good in his sight, he gives his full consent; and insofar as this attitude comes to be toward a friend, love includes the concord by which someone consents to things as they seem [good] to his friend—not, indeed, in speculative matters, since concord in such matters, according to the Philosopher in the Ethics 9, (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 9.6, 1167a25.) does not pertain to friendship. And disagreement about matters like this can exist without injuring the friendship, because agreement or disagreement about speculative truths is not something subject to the will; valid argumentation compels the intellect’s assent. Nevertheless, over and above what belongs to the four things that have just been described, love adds a special note, namely, the appetite’s resting in the beloved; lacking this, none of those four is able to exist.

There are also terms that add some distinctive note beyond what is signified by “rational love” and “love.” For infatuation adds, beyond love, the note of a peculiar intensity of love, as if a sort of blazing heat. Friendship, however, adds two notes: first, the fellowship of lover and beloved in a mutual love, such that they love each other and know that they love each other; second, that they act out of free choice, not merely from passion. Hence the Philosopher says (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 8.5, 1157b28–29.) that friendship is like a habit, but infatuation like a passion. Accordingly, it is clear that friendship, which includes in itself all that has been mentioned, is the most perfect among things pertaining to love. And for this reason charity—which is a friendship between man and God, by which man loves God and God loves man, bringing about an association of man with God, as is said in 1 John 1:7: if we walk in the light as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another—ought to be placed in a genus of this kind.

Reply Obj. 1: Any friendship includes concupiscence or desire, and adds something beyond it, as was said.

Reply Obj. 2: Charity adds something beyond rational love and love.

Reply Obj. 3: And a similar response should be made to the third, about benevolence, to the fourth, about concord, and to the fifth, about beneficence.

Reply Obj. 6: Peace may be traced back to concord—except that, to be precise, peace is spoken of more in regard to removal of disagreement between parties, while concord is spoken of more in regard to the union itself between them.

Reply Obj. 7: Charity is a friendship, but adds something beyond friendship commonly so-called, namely, a specification of who the friend is, since it is friendship toward God, who is more precious and dearer than all things.

Reply Sed Contra 8: A friend not only loves the friend with whom he is joined in friendship, but also everything that pertains to the friend, for example his sons, his brothers, and suchlike, even if he is not loved by them in return. In like manner, charity causes one chiefly to love God, who loves those loving him and who anticipates them in his loving, but it also causes one to love men insofar as they belong to him. Hence when it was said that friendship concerns a returning of love, this has to be understood with respect to those between whom the friendship chiefly exists.

Reply Sed Contra 9: Insofar as men are made God-like by charity, they are indeed above mere men, and their conversation is in heaven (Phil 3:20); and it is in this way that they live together with God and the angels, insofar as men stretch themselves toward similar things, in accord with what the Lord teaches: be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect (Matt 5:48).

Reply Sed Contra 10: When friendship is spoken of as “not hidden,” it is not because a friend’s love is known with certainty, but because the mutual love of friends can be gathered from probable signs. Charity, too, can be manifest in the same way, for someone seeing the signs of charity in himself can make a probable judgment that he has charity.

Reply Sed Contra 11: While true friendship does desire to see the friend in person, and makes one rejoice in speaking together with the one who is the primary object of friendship, still the pleasure that comes from mutual beholding and enjoyment is not set as the end of true friendship, as is done in the friendship of pleasure. And this is what Jerome intends to remove, by teaching that the friendship of charity is not directed chiefly toward being with and speaking with other men but rather is joined by the glue of Christ, (Jerome, Epistulae, epist. 53: Ad Paulinum, J. Divjak, 1981, para. 1 (CSEL 88:442; PL 22:540).) and that the pleasure of companionship with friends should not be sought as the main thing.

Reply Sed Contra 12: That objection has truth in regard to that toward which the friendship mainly looks, not about those who are loved insofar as they pertain to the main friend; for in this way, the friendship of charity extends to many.

Article 2

Whether charity is a virtue

To the second we proceed thus. (Parallels: ST II-II.23.3; De caritate, a. 2.) It seems that charity is not a virtue.

Obj. 1: For charity, as was said, is a certain friendship between man and God. But friendship is not set down as a virtue by the philosophers, although it has virtue for its foundation, since it exists on account of the noble good that virtue is. Therefore charity is not a virtue.

Obj. 2: Further, the commandments of the law are about acts of the virtues. But the end of the commandments is charity (1 Tim 1:5). (RSV renders this as “the aim of our charge is love.”) Therefore charity is the end of the virtues. But the end of the virtues is not virtue, but happiness. Therefore charity is not a virtue.

Obj. 3: Further, “virtue” bespeaks the ultimate a power can do, as is said in On the Heavens 1. (Aristotle, On the Heavens 1.11, 281a11; Aquinas, De Caelo, bk. 1, lect. 25, n. 4.) But pleasure, or delight, is something more ultimate than love, since it comes about in the very joining of lover and the object of his love, which is the union love seeks. Therefore pleasure ought to be called a virtue more than love. But since pleasure is not set down as a virtue, neither should charity be called a virtue.

Obj. 4: Further, if nature suffices in the doing of some work, there is no need for nature to be elevated by [a special] virtue. But insofar as man is able to know by natural reason that God is the highest good, man is able, owing to something naturally in him, to love God above all things—and this is the act proper to charity. Therefore it would be needless to add, over and above this, any virtue of charity.

Obj. 5: Further, in order to make for an end, it is enough to know it and desire it. But charity causes more than that, since it makes one love God and have friendship with him. Therefore it was not necessary for charity to be a theological virtue, but desire would have been enough.

Obj. 6: Further, virtue concerns difficult things, as is said in the Ethics 2. (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 2.3, 1105a9.) But loving is not difficult; on the contrary, love lightens all difficult things. Therefore charity is not a virtue.

On the contrary, the commandments of the law are about acts of the virtues. But charity fulfills all the commandments of the law, since love is the fulfilling of the law (Rom 13:10). Therefore charity is a virtue.

Furthermore, spiritual existence is caused by virtue. But there is no spiritual existence without charity. Hence the Apostle says, if I have all faith . . . but do not have love, I am nothing (1 Cor 13:2). Therefore charity is most of all a virtue.

Furthermore, nothing expels sin except virtue. But charity, which covers all offenses (Prov 10:12), does this most of all. Therefore charity is a virtue.

I answer that the end of human life is happiness. Hence, according to the diverse lives men lead are distinguished diverse kinds of happiness corresponding to them. Those who are outside civic life cannot arrive at civic happiness, which belongs to the height of that life. In like manner, if someone is going to arrive at contemplative happiness, he has to become a partaker of that life. Consequently, the happiness that man can arrive at by the exercise of his natural powers is a happiness at the level of human life; and this is what the philosophers spoke of, for which reason it is said in the Ethics 1, (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 1.10, 1101a20.) happy, however, as men.

But since to us is promised a happiness in which we shall be equal to the angels, as is evident from Matthew 22:30—a happiness exceeding not only the powers of man but the powers of angels, too, who, like us, must be led to this end by grace, for to God alone is such happiness natural—it follows that if man is to attain that divine happiness, he must be made a partaker of the divine life.

Now, that which most of all causes one to live together with another is friendship, as the Philosopher says in the Ethics 9, (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 9.12, 1172a5.) each one keeps company with his friend in the activities he especially loves and takes as the center of his life, as if [above all] wishing to live with his friend. Thus we find that some go hunting together, others drink together, others talk philosophy together, and so on in regard to other things that people value.

Accordingly, [if a man is going to keep company with God as with a friend], there needs to be a certain friendship with God by which we would live together with him; and this is charity, as was said. But this sharing of divine life exceeds the faculties of nature, as also does the happiness to which the sharing is ordered. And for this reason, nature has to be brought to this perfection by some superadded gift, which is the very notion of [an infused] virtue. Hence charity must be called a theological virtue, which is “poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit which has been given to us” (Rom 5:5).

Reply Obj. 1: The kind of friendship discussed by the Philosopher is caused either by an inclination of nature, as in friendships based on pleasure or utility, or by the inclination of a virtuous habit, with that natural inclination presupposed, as in friendship based on what is noble, insofar as everything that makes people alike tends to cause love between them. And so, friendship is not set down as a virtue of theirs, but rather as something following upon the virtues. Yet the friendship we have with God cannot have any such foundation, since it exceeds the boundaries of nature. We must therefore be lifted up to this friendship by a special gift; and this gift we call a virtue.

Reply Obj. 2: Charity is not said to be the end of the commandments as if it were the ultimate end of the virtues, but rather as being that by which all the other virtues are given their proper ordering to the ultimate end. And in the passage cited, the Apostle excludes from charity three things repugnant to true friendship: first, insincerity, as found in those who simulate friendship, when they are not really friends, which he excludes by saying sincere faith, taking faith here to mean fidelity; second, an evil foundation, as found in people who come together to share a certain sin and become friends on that account, which he excludes by saying a good conscience; third, an ulterior motive, as found when someone loves a friend for the sake of lucre, which he excludes by saying a pure heart.

Reply Obj. 3: Since virtues are praiseworthy, they must have a point of origin within us. By contrast, pleasure, (Or "delight.") since it comes from being joined with something fitting, is spoken of as a certain reception, and so as a passion, which originates from an agent. For this reason, pleasure belongs rather to the aspect of reward. But love signifies the stretching out of the appetite into the thing loved and implies this activity. Accordingly, charity is set down as a virtue, but enjoyment, which pleasure implies, is set down as a dowry.

Reply Obj. 4: Charity, as is evident from what was said before, includes friendship, love, and desire. But a natural desire can only be for a thing that is capable of being possessed naturally; hence a natural desire for the highest good is in us by nature—in the sense that, and so far as, this highest good can be participated in by us through its natural effects. Similarly, love is caused by likeness; hence the highest good is naturally loved above all things, insofar as we have a likeness to him through natural goods. But since nature cannot arrive at the highest good’s activities, which are his very life and happiness—cannot arrive, that is, at the vision of the divine essence—for the same reason, it does not attain the intimacy with him of a friendship that makes friends live together and share in the same works. And so there is a need for charity, by which we would have friendship with God, to be added above [what is possible to nature]—both that we might love him as he is in himself, having been made like unto him through sharing in spiritual gifts, and that we might desire him as sharable by his friends in the state of glory.

Reply Obj. 5: Desire does not suffice; there must also be a sharing of life, as was said. (Above, q. 1, a. 1.)

Reply Obj. 6: The difficulty found in works of virtue is not always a difficulty of labor or of something saddening; rather, the matters handled by a virtue are correctly said to involve difficulty to the degree that the right handling of them is on a level beyond the powers of those who lack that virtue.

Article 3

Whether reason is the subject of charity

To the third we proceed thus. (Parallels: ST I-II.56.6; II-II.24.1; De virtutibus, a. 5.) It seems that the subject of charity is reason.

Obj. 1: For as is said in the Ethics 1, (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 1.13, 1103a3.) the subject of every virtue is either the rational by participation or the rational by essence. But charity is a virtue, as was said. Since its subject is not the rational by participation—for if it were, it would be a moral virtue—it seems, therefore, that its subject has to be the rational by essence. [But this is nothing other than intellect or reason. Therefore charity has reason for its subject.]

Obj. 2: Further, whenever there are two things one of which always casts out the other, they must have their existence in the same subject. But charity and mortal sin mutually cast each other out. Since every mortal sin is either in the superior reason or in the inferior reason, as was said in Book II, (In II Sent., d. 24, q. 3, aa. 3, 4.) it therefore seems that charity, too, has reason for its subject.

Obj. 3: Further, as charity is chief among virtues freely given, so prudence is chief among moral virtues. But reason is the subject of prudence; therefore, it is also that of charity.

Obj. 4: Further, since charity is a theological virtue, it cannot be in the soul’s sensitive part, which cannot have God for its object. It must therefore be in the soul’s intellectual part. But it is not in free will, since free will has for its object a contingent thing that can be brought about and chosen by us, whereas charity is of the ultimate end, which in no way belongs to the class of contingent, workable, choosable things. Nor, likewise, can charity be in the will, since the will does not have a determinate act of its own but commands all the other acts of the soul—so that, if charity were in the will, for the same reason every other virtue would also be in the will [, which is false]. Therefore the only option remaining is that charity has reason for its subject.

Obj. 5: Further, in their treatments of virtue, philosophers did not posit any virtue in the will, positing instead intellectual virtues in the part of the soul that is rational by essence and moral virtues in the part that is rational by participation, to which part belong the irascible and concupiscible powers, as is clear from the Ethics 1. (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 1.13, 1103a5.) Since charity is a virtue, it therefore seems that it is not in the will.

On the contrary, reason’s object is the true, whereas charity’s object is not the true but rather the good. Therefore charity has the will for its subject, not reason.

Furthermore, love pertains to appetite, whereas reason pertains to knowledge. Therefore charity does not have reason for its subject.

I answer that in order to know what power some virtue is in, one must consider the power to which the virtue’s act is related. Now the chief act of charity is to love God, which indeed belongs to reason as directing, but to appetite as executing; hence it must be traced back to appetite. But this act cannot be executed by sensitive appetite, since this appetite cannot have God for its object. Therefore this act must pertain to the intellectual part’s appetite—not insofar as it chooses things that may lead to the end, but insofar as it is related to the ultimate end itself, and this, too, belongs to the will. Hence charity has the will for its proper subject.

Certain ones, however, say that charity is in the concupiscible power. But this cannot be the case, since the concupiscible power is part of the sensitive appetite, and even if the concupiscible power be styled “human” [to distinguish it from the power as found in brute animals], still it does not have this humanness except by participating in reason—unless perhaps someone might wish, speaking equivocally, to call the will itself irascible and concupiscible.

Reply Obj. 1: “The part of the soul that is rational by essence” does not mean reason alone, but also includes the appetite annexed to reason, namely, the will. Hence the Philosopher says in On the Soul 3 (Aristotle, On the Soul 3.9, 432b5; Aquinas, Sent. De anima, bk. 3, lect. 14, n. 802.) that “the will is in reason.” And so, charity is neither a moral virtue, since it is not about the passions belonging to the sensitive appetite, which is rational by participation, nor an intellectual virtue, ,for it is not with respect to powers of apprehension that it exists in the part rational by essence, but it is a theological virtue.

Reply Obj. 2: Mortal sin is not always said to be “in the reason” as in a subject, since at times it has for its subject the irascible power, at times the conscupiscible; but mortal sin is always “in the reason” as in the power directing the act of sin, and “in the will” or free will as in the power commanding and eliciting the act of sin. In this way, charity, too, has reason—or rather, understanding—as director of its acts.

Reply Obj. 3: Prudence is chief among moral virtues insofar as it directs all of them, and on this account it pertains to reason; whereas charity is chief by way of commanding various acts and conjoining the lover to an end and forming the appetite, all of which pertains to the will.

Reply Obj. 4: Charity’s subject, properly speaking, is neither sensitive appetite nor free will but simply the will, which, although related in a certain way to all human acts as their cause, nevertheless does not stand in the same relation toward all. For certain acts it elicits of itself, inasmuch as it is a specific power—for example, the very act of willing—while other acts it commands, inasmuch as it is universal mover of the soul’s powers. Accordingly, virtues that bring to perfection acts merely commanded by the will do not have the will itself for their subject, but instead, whatever specific powers elicit those acts, whereas the virtues that bring to perfection acts that the will elicits do have the will for their subject; and so, the same account cannot be given for all of them. To love, however, is an act elicited by the will, for it implies a resting of the will and a certain transformation into the thing loved. Thus, charity, which brings this act to perfection, has the will for its subject.

Reply Obj. 5: As was said above, (Above, d. 23, q. 1, a. 1.) virtues are necessary for us in order that the soul’s natural powers should be determined to good. Thus, for matters in regard to which natural powers are, of their nature, determined to good, virtues are not required. Now the will has for its object the good, which is the end. Hence, as far as its own nature is concerned, the will is naturally determined to good—the good proportionate to human nature. And for this reason the philosophers posited no virtue in the will with respect to the ultimate end. Nevertheless, some acquired virtue must be posited in the will insofar as the will is concerned with things that lead to the end—the virtue, namely, of justice, as will be explained below, (D. 33, q. 2, a. 4, resp. 2.) which has to do with goods that come into the use of daily life. Even so, justice is counted among moral virtues, since, although the will according to its essence is in the part of the soul that is rational by essence, nevertheless owing to a likeness between its act and theirs it is grouped together with the irascible and concupiscible powers, which are called rational by participation. Moreover, the will itself in some way participates in reason, insofar as it is directed by reason in the latter’s function of apprehending goods. According to the doctrine of the faith, however, an ultimate end is given that exceeds natural inclination. It is therefore necessary, according to theologians, to posit some virtue in the will, for the purpose of lifting it up to this end; and this we call charity.

Article 4

Whether charity is one virtue or many

Quaestiuncula 1

To the fourth we proceed thus. (Parallels: ST II-II.23.5; De caritate, a. 4.) It seems that charity is not a single virtue.

Obj. 1: For habits are distinguished by their acts, and acts by their objects. But charity has two objects at the greatest distance from each other, namely, God and neighbor. Therefore it is not a single virtue.

Obj. 2: Further, theological virtues are different from moral virtues because moral virtues direct a person in regard to things that lead to the end, whereas theological virtues are about the end itself. But charity is about both the end itself and things that lead to the end, inasmuch as both God and neighbor are loved by charity. Therefore charity contains two virtues, of which one is moral and the other theological.

Obj. 3: Further, virtues are ordered to specific sorts of acts, since virtue is productive of the best, as is said in the Ethics 2; (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 2.6, 1106b22.) and they place an appropriate manner of acting in their acts, since virtue consists not only in doing good things, but in doing them well; and again, acts of the virtues are commanded by the commandments of the law. But charity has two acts, two manners of acting, and two commandments. Therefore it is not a single virtue.

On the contrary, there is only one [first] mover in any given genus. But charity moves all the other virtues to their ends by means of their proper acts. Therefore charity is a single virtue.

Furthermore, since it is a theological virtue, charity’s object is God. But God is supremely one. Therefore charity, too, is only one virtue.

Quaestiuncula 2

Obj. 1: Furthermore, it seems that charity is not distinct from other virtues. (Parallels: ST II-II.23.4; De malo, q. 8, a. 2; q. 11, a. 2; De caritate, a. 5.) Whatever falls within the definition of virtue as such cannot be that which distinguishes one virtue from another. But charity is this kind of thing. Hence, Jerome says, to sum up briefly the whole definition of virtue: virtue is the charity by which God and neighbor are loved. (Augustine, Epistulae, epist. 167: ad Hieronymus, para. 4 (CSEL 44:602; PL 33:739).) And Augustine says that virtue is the order of love. (Augustine, The City of God, bk. 15, ch. 22 (CCSL 48; PL 41:467).) Therefore charity is not a virtue distinct from other virtues.

Obj. 2: Further, virtues are distinguished from one another by their acts. But the acts of all other virtues are attributed to charity, as is clear from 1 Corinthians 13. Therefore charity is not a virtue distinct from other virtues.

Obj. 3: Further, any special virtue has a special object. Charity, in contrast, does not have a special object, but one common to all, namely, the good. Therefore charity is not a special virtue.

Obj. 4: Further, the commandments of the law are about acts of the virtues. But the commandment that pertains to charity is not contradistinguished from the other commandments, but rather it contains all the other commandments in itself. Therefore charity is not a virtue distinct from other virtues.

On the contrary, whenever a genus is divided into species, the members so divided are distinct from one another. But charity is distinguished from the other theological virtues, according to 1 Corinthians 13, and according to Gregory, (Gregory the Great, Moralia in Iob, bk. 1, para. 27 (CCSL 143; PL 75:544).) who says that charity is symbolized by one of the daughters of Job. Therefore it is a special virtue.

Furthermore, in the Ethics 5 (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 5.2, 1130a14.) the Philosopher proves that justice is a special virtue because it has a special vice contrary to it alone. But charity has a special vice contrary to it alone, namely hatred. Therefore charity is a special virtue.

Quaestiuncula 3

Obj. 1: Furthermore, it seems that charity is not the form of the other virtues. (Parallels: In II Sent., d. 26, a. 4, ad 5; In III Sent., d. 23, q. 3, a. 1, resp. 1; ST II-II.23.8; De veritate, q. 14, a. 5; De malo, q. 8, a. 2; De caritate, a. 3.) For every form is either an exemplar form or an intrinsic form. But charity is not the exemplar form of the virtues, since on that supposition all the other virtues would be drawn into the same species; nor is it an intrinsic form, since then it would give being and species to the other virtues, and in that way all the virtues would be of the same species and would be in the same subject as charity is, nor would they be distinct from it. Therefore in no way is charity the form of the virtues.

Obj. 2: Further, charity differs from grace. But grace is said to be the form of all the virtues, since it makes an act meritorious. Therefore charity is not the form.

Obj. 3: Further, as power stands to power, so habit stands to habit. But reason imposes an appropriate manner of acting on all the other forces of the soul; therefore a habit existing in the reason imposes such a manner on all the other habits. And thus, faith—or even prudence, which is described by the philosophers as though it were the form of all the other virtues—is more the form of the virtues than charity.

Obj. 4: Further, form, agent, and end do not come together in something numerically one, as is said in the Physics 2. (Aristotle, Physics 2.7, 198a25; Aquinas, In Physic., bk. 2, lect. 11, n. 2.) But charity is the end of the commandments and thus of the virtues, and it is a mover, too, insofar as it commands the acts of the virtues. Therefore it is not a form.

Obj. 5: Further, habits are revealed through acts proceeding from them. But any virtue whatsoever imposes its manner of acting or its form upon the act proceeding from it, so that, accordingly, a just man works justly, and a brave man acts bravely. Therefore the virtues are not formed through charity but are formed through themselves.

On the contrary, Ambrose says (Ambrose, Commentaria in Epistolas B. Pauli (I ad Corinth.), ch. 8, v. 2 (PL 17:239).) that charity informs all the other virtues and is their mother.

Furthermore, that which is foremost even in bodily things is formal with respect to others in the same order, as fire is in a certain way the form of air, and air of water, and water of earth, as is said in the Physics 4. (Aristotle, Physics 4.5, 213a1–3; Aquinas, In Physic., bk. 4, lect. 8, n. 7.) But charity has first place among the virtues. Therefore it itself is the form of the virtues.

Quaestiuncula 4

Obj. 1: Furthermore, it seems that charity can exist while being unformed by grace. (Parallels: ST I-II.65.2; 4; II-II.23.7.) For just as faith continues to exist in one who believes but does not act rightly, so too can the love by which God is loved exist in such a person, since even sinners and infidels love God. But faith lacking good works is unformed by grace; in like manner, therefore, charity lacking good works is unformed by grace.

Obj. 2: Further, no one knows whether or not he has grace. But someone can know that he has love. Therefore the love of God can exist without grace, and so it can exist in an unformed state.

Obj. 3: Further, from faith arise both fear and love. But fear can exist in an unformed state, as servile fear proves. Therefore, so can love.

On the contrary, the Holy Spirit cannot be present and active without grace being present and active. But “God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit” (Rom 5:5). Therefore charity cannot exist while being unformed by grace.

Furthermore, a form cannot be unformed, but charity is the form of all the other virtues. Therefore it cannot itself be unformed.

Response to Quaestiuncula 1

I answer that a virtue derives its species from its object according to the notion under which the virtue chiefly tends to the object. Hence, since charity chiefly loves God, and does not love anything else except insofar as it is of God, it is apparent that charity receives unity and is a single virtue from the unity of divine goodness to which it first has reference.

Reply Obj. 1: The neighbor is not the chief object of charity itself, as was said.

Reply Obj. 2: Theological virtues direct one also as regards things that lead to the end—not, indeed, according to the proper notions of the things that lead to the end, but according to the nature of the end. For even as faith causes one to believe certain things about creatures on account of the first truth from which one receives faith, so, in like manner, does charity cause one to love men insofar as they are capable of participating in the divine goodness, which is the ultimate end.

Reply Obj. 3: A material diversity of objects suffices for numerical diversity of acts, but only a diversity of formal objects brings about diversity of species among acts. Now, a formal diversity of object derives from that notion of the object to which either a habit or a power chiefly refers. Accordingly, while loving God and loving neighbor are indeed diverse acts, they still pertain to the same habit, just as seeing white and seeing black, or seeing something close at hand and seeing something far away, are numerically different acts of sight taking place in different ways, yet pertain to one seeing power. And thus, too, diverse commandments are given about acts of charity, according to the diverse measures they have.

Response to Quaestiuncula 2

To the second question, it should be said that, as was said, (Above, a. 3.) habits derive their species from their correlative objects, according to that notion of an object to which a habit chiefly refers. Now, an object’s notion is taken according to the relationship between the thing toward which the habit or power exercises its activity, and the act of the soul in which the habits or powers exist. Since, however, it happens that things which in reality are joined together and are supremely one are sometimes divided by the soul’s activity, it therefore happens that where a thing is the same, there may yet be diverse notions of the object, as, for example, the same thing is the object of liberality as able to be given away freely to another, and of justice as having the nature of a debt owed to another. And likewise, where a thing is really common, the object’s notion is particular and proper, as, for example, first philosophy, although it considers being as common to all, is a special science precisely because it considers being under a special notion, namely, being insofar as it does not depend on matter and motion.

The case is similar in the matter under discussion. For the chief and proper object of charity is the divine goodness. Now, while there is some divine good aspired to in all the other virtues, yet this very good, common in reality, has itself a special notion. And so, charity is a special virtue distinct from all the others.

Reply Obj. 1: Just as in the realm of sciences perfection is imparted to all the other sciences by a single special science distinct from them, namely, first philosophy, insofar as its object is common in reality to the objects of all the other sciences, so, too, is it in the realm of virtues: that which pertains to a single virtue can be placed in the common definition of virtue, as is evident with prudence, which perfects the notion of virtue in all the moral virtues. And so, right reason, which pertains to prudence, is placed in the definition of virtue as such, as is evident from the Ethics 2: virtue is a choice-productive habit consisting in a mean determined by reason, as a wise man would determine it; (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 2.6, 1106b36.) nor from this should it be concluded that prudence is not a special virtue, but rather, that it is a general rule of all virtues.

And so it is that charity, too, which perfects all the other virtues, is placed in the common definition of virtue; nor from this should it be concluded that charity is a general virtue, but rather, that it is a general perfection of the virtues. Nevertheless, Augustine’s statement that virtue is the order of love (Augustine, The City of God, bk. 15, ch. 22 (CCSL 48; PL 41:467).) can be understood in two ways: either interpreting “love” to mean the love of charity itself, and then the aforesaid response holds; or interpreting “love” to mean love in general, and in this way “love” is taken for that natural love which exists in any power whatsoever with respect to its object, to which love virtue gives a suitable determination, since virtue is the ordering of the soul’s affections.

Certain ones, however, not paying attention to the difference between natural love and appetite and animal love and appetite, erred to the extent of maintaining that the concupiscible was not a special power but [something] diffused in all the other powers ; and, in like manner, maintained that charity was indistinct from the other virtues.

Reply Obj. 2: Acts of other virtues are not attributed to charity as though it elicits them itself, but rather because it commands them. It does, however, have a special act to elicit, namely loving God.

Reply Obj. 3: Charity’s object is not any good whatsoever, but the divine good; and this good also, although it is in some way present in all goods, nevertheless has a special notion, as was said.

Reply Obj. 4: The commandment pertaining to charity does not embrace all the other commandments as though it were a sort of universal in comparison to those things, but instead in the manner of a sort of leading-back of the others to it, since all commandments are ordered to that one, just as the acts of all the other virtues are ordered to the act of charity, insofar as it commands them all. Hence, from this fact is established, not that charity is a general virtue, but that it is a general mover of all the virtues.

Response to Quaestiuncula 3

To the third question, it should be said that charity may be compared to all other virtues as their mover, as their end, and as their form.

That it is the mover of all the other virtues is evident from the fact that the good itself, which is charity’s object under the notion of final end, is the [common] end of the virtues. But in all powers or arts of a single order, it happens that the art or power that has to do with the ultimate end orders the acts of other arts or powers to their proper ends, as the military art, which exists for the sake of victory, to which every particular military task is ordered, orders the equestrian and naval arts to their ends.

And so, charity is called “mother” of the other virtues, insofar as she brings forth their acts from her conception of the end, which functions in the manner of a seed, since the end is the point of departure for matters of action, as the Philosopher says. (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 7.8, 1151a16.) Now, [a virtue that has to do with the end] is said to command the acts of lower virtues insofar as it makes them do their work for the sake of its end, and in this way it moves other lower arts toward its end. Hence charity also moves all the other virtues toward its end, and in this way it is said to command their acts. For there is this difference between eliciting and commanding an act: a habit or power elicits that act which it produces in regard to its own object, without the mediation of anything else; but it commands an act when that act is produced by the mediation of a lower power or habit in regard to that power’s object. In this way, therefore, charity is the mover of the other virtues.

Charity is likewise their end. For it belongs to all the virtues in common that their acts are their proximate ends, since activity is second perfection and habit first perfection, and the less complete is ordered to the more complete as to an end. Now the end of a lower power or habit is ordered to the end of a higher-ranking one, just as a military end is ordered to a civic end. Consequently, the acts of all the other virtues are ordered to the act of charity as to an end. And it is for this reason that charity is called the end of the commandments (1 Tim 1:5). (RSV renders this as “the aim of our charge.”)

It is likewise evident that charity is the form that causes the notion of virtue to be perfectly realized in each and every virtue. For a lower power does not have the perfection of virtue except by participating in the perfection of a higher-ranking power, as, for example, a habit in the irascible power does not have the nature of virtue, as is said in the Ethics 6, (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 6.13, 1144b1–5.) except inasmuch as it receives understanding and discernment from reason, which prudence perfects; and accordingly, prudence places a form and an appropriate manner of acting into all the other moral virtues.

Now, all the virtues that can merit eternal life—and it is from this vantage that we are now speaking of virtues—exist in powers subject to the will, since a power’s act can be meritorious only to the extent that it has something of the voluntary in it, and voluntariness has place whenever the will moves and commands the acts of other powers. Hence it is impossible that a habit existing in some power of the soul should have the nature of virtue—if one is speaking of meritorious virtues, as we are doing here—except to the extent that such a power participates in something of the perfection of a will that is perfected by charity. And therefore charity is the form of all the other virtues, as prudence is the form of the moral virtues. And this is one way in which charity is the form of the other virtues. The other two ways [in which charity is the form of the virtues] can be taken from the fact that charity is mover and end, insofar as a mover puts its motion into the instrument, and insofar as things that lead to the end are directed in accord with the notion of the end [as it pre-exists in the agent]. And it is thus that charity’s manner of acting is participated in by the other virtues, insofar as they are moved by charity and are ordered to it as their end.

Reply Obj. 1: Charity is the exemplar form of the virtues. But there are two kinds of exemplar form. One is the original in imitation of which something is made; and for this [sort of imitation to occur], nothing other than a mere likeness is required, as we say that real things in the world are exemplar forms of paintings. Another kind of exemplar form is that according to the likeness of which something is made and through participation in which it has being, as the divine goodness is the exemplar form of every goodness, and the divine wisdom, of every wisdom; and such an exemplar form need not be of one and the same species with the effects caused by it, since participants do not always participate [in the perfections of their cause] in the mode of that cause in which they participate. And this is the way in which prudence is the form of the other moral virtues, for, by impressing upon lower powers a sort of seal of prudence, it gives to the habits found in them the notion of virtue. And something similar holds for charity with respect to all the other virtues.

Reply Obj. 2: Lower powers are not perfected by the perfection of virtue except by participating in the perfection of higher-ranking ones. Now, since higher-ranking things are formal with respect to lower-ranking things, as being more perfect, what is participated in from the higher-ranking is formal in the lower-ranking. Hence, for the perfection of virtue in any power is required [a participation in] as many forms as are higher-ranking with respect to that power. For example, reason is higher-ranking than the concupiscible appetite, as placing order in it; and so, prudence, which is reason’s perfection, is the form of temperance, which is a virtue in the concupiscible appetite. Similarly, the will is higher-ranking than reason, insofar as reason’s act is viewed as a voluntary and meritorious act; and so, charity is the form of prudence and temperance alike. Similarly, the soul’s essence is superior to the will, insofar as the will and all the other powers of the soul flow from the soul’s essence; and so, grace, which is the perfection of the soul’s essence, establishing it in spiritual being, is the form of charity, prudence, and temperance alike. Nor would charity be a virtue if it were without grace, as neither would prudence be a virtue if it were without charity, nor temperance, without charity and prudence—as long as we are speaking of infused virtues ordered to gaining merit.

Some, however, say that charity and grace are the same in essence; but this has been discussed in Book II. (In II Sent., d. 26, a. 4.)

Reply Obj. 3: Reason imposes a manner of acting on all the powers under its governance, and the will, likewise, on all the powers lower than it. But the philosophers did not maintain that virtue was given form by anything other than prudence because neither in the will, so far as it pertains to the ultimate end, nor in the soul’s essence, did they posit any perfection added over and above that of human nature. Nevertheless, the natural perfection in which all the virtues participate remains.

Reply Obj. 4: Exemplar form comes together with agent and end in something numerically one, as is evident with God, but intrinsic form does not.

Reply Obj. 5: Lower things participate in the perfections of higher things after the former’s own manner; and so, the participants’ participations are determined for them by their own capacity and nature. Accordingly, any virtue in a lower power has a certain form by which it is constituted a virtue owing to its participation in a higher power’s perfection, while it has the form by which it is this virtue from the nature of the particular power in which it exists, through that power’s determination to its proper object. And any virtue places into its own act this form and manner of acting as well as the form or manner it has from the higher power, as, for example, [infused] temperance places into its act a manner of acting proper to temperance, as well as that which it has from prudence, from charity, and from grace.

Response to Quaestiuncula 4

I answer that charity can never exist while being unformed by grace; and on this point all authorities agree. According to some, however, this happens because of the fact that charity is nothing other than the Holy Spirit. But in Book I, (In I Sent., d. 17, q. 1, aa. 1, 2.) this position was destroyed. According to others, charity is the same as grace—which was rejected in Book II. (In II Sent., d. 26, a. 4.)

It is therefore necessary to assign other reasons. From what has been said up to this point, two such reasons can be gathered. The first is taken from charity’s effect; for, since charity is a certain friendship that requires friends to live together, there cannot be charity unless there be a sharing of divine life, which comes through grace; and therefore charity cannot exist without grace. The second reason can be gathered from the fact that charity is the mover and form of all the virtues. Hence, inasmuch as every sin is opposed to the act of some virtue, every [mortal] sin takes away charity. And since grace cannot be taken away except by sin, it follows that charity is taken away as soon as grace is removed.

Reply Obj. 1: To faith is specifically opposed not every sin, but rather, every infidelity; and so, just as the habit of faith is entirely taken away when a man errs about one article of faith, as was said above, so the habit of charity is entirely taken away when any sin opposed to charity is committed. Hence, nothing ever remains unformed in charity, whereas this can happen in the other virtues.

Reply Obj. 2: A man does not know whether or not the rational love he is aware of having is specifically the rational love that is charity. Hence, just as a man does not know whether or not he has grace, so he does not know whether or not he has charity.

Reply Obj. 3: Fear does not require a sharing of divine life, as does the love of charity. And therefore love and fear are not similar in this respect.

Question 3

The act of charity

The next thing to be inquired about is the act of charity by which God is loved, since the place for inquiry about loving one’s neighbor will come later.

We will inquire into four things here:

first, whether it is possible for us to love God in his very essence, directly and immediately;

second, whether he can be totally loved;

third, whether the love by which we love God has any measure;

fourth, whether the measure of acting contained in the commandment of charity—namely, with all your heart, with all your soul, etc.—can be fulfilled in the wayfaring state.

Article 1

Whether God can be immediately loved by wayfarers

To the first we proceed thus. (Parallels: ST II-II.27.4; De veritate, q. 10, a. 11, ad 6; De caritate, a. 2, ad 11.) It seems that God cannot be loved by us directly and immediately, as long as we are in the wayfaring state.

Obj. 1: For intellect is quicker than affection; hence Augustine says that intellect flies ahead, but affection lags behind or comes not at all. (Augustine, Enarrationes in Psalmos, Ps 118, serm. 8, para. 4 (CCSL 40; PL 37:1521–22).) But our intellect in the wayfaring state cannot see God directly and immediately; therefore neither can our affection love him in that way.

Obj. 2: Further, love cannot be had for the unknown and the unseen; hence the Philosopher says in the Ethics 9, no one begins to love a beauty in which he did not already take delight. (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 9.5, 1167a4.) But in the wayfaring state we do not see the divine essence. Therefore neither can we love it in its essence immediately.

Obj. 3: Further, knowledge had in heaven exceeds knowledge had in the wayfaring state, insofar as man in heaven sees God directly and immediately in his essence. If therefore in the wayfaring state man could love God without mediation, the charity of heaven would not surpass the charity of the wayfaring state.

Obj. 4: Further, in the wayfaring state we are unable to see God directly and immediately because of the fact that we rise from visible things to the knowledge of invisible things. But in like manner, we go from love of visible things to love of invisible things. Hence Gregory says in one of his homilies: the kingdom of heaven is spoken of under the likeness of earthly things, so that, by way of what the soul already knew to love, it might learn also to love what is unknown. (Gregory the Great, Homiliae in Evangelia, serm. 11, para. 1 (CCSL 141:74; PL 76:1114).) And in the Preface it says: that by knowing God visibly, we may, through this, be borne off into love for what is invisible. (Gregory the Great, In nativit. Dom. (PL 78:31).) In like manner, therefore, in the wayfaring state we do not love God directly and immediately.

Obj. 5: Further, the will, which is the first root of sin, ought to be corrupted more by sin than any other power of the soul is corrupted. But [in man’s fallen condition] the intellect cannot exercise its act, which is seeing, immediately as regards God. Therefore neither can the will exercise an act of love with God as immedate object.

On the contrary, Augustine says in the Confessions, woe to those who love your traces in place of you. (Not the Confessions, but rather, Augustine, De libero arbitrio, bk. 2, ch. 16, n. 43 (CCSL 29; PL 32:1264).) The phrase “traces of God,” however, refers to the participations of divine goodness found in creatures. Therefore holy men and women in the wayfaring state love God directly and immediately, and not only insofar as his goodness is participated in by creatures.

Furthermore, the knowledge proper to the wayfaring state is enigmatic and destined to be emptied out, owing to the fact that it knows God through the mediation of created things. But love never ends (1 Cor 13:8). Therefore charity does not love God through the mediation of any created thing.

Furthermore, that which is a middle term of knowing something is the reason for that knowledge; and it ought to be similar with rational love. But creatures are not the reason for loving God; quite the contrary, God is the reason for loving creatures, most of all when we are speaking about the love that is charity. Therefore [even in this life] God is directly and immediately loved in his essence.

I answer that, for ordered powers, the following truth obtains: where a prior power’s activity has its terminus, there a subsequent power’s activity begins, as it is evident that sensation ends in imagination, which is a motion produced from sense-in-act, and intellect begins where imagination ends, since the intellect takes phantasms for its object, as is said in On the Soul 3. (Aristotle, On the Soul 3.7, 430a15–18; Aquinas, Sent. De anima, bk. 3, lect. 12, nn. 770–72.) Consequently, about things that have no phantasms, the intellect can gather no knowledge, except on the basis of things whose phantasms are represented to it. Hence in the wayfaring state, in which it gathers [intelligible forms] from phantasms, the intellect cannot see God directly and immediately, but has to arrive at a knowledge of him on the basis of visible things whose phantasms it grasps. Now, although it does not directly and immediately see his very essence, the intellect’s knowledge nevertheless ends in [a knowledge of] God himself, since from his effects it apprehends that he exists. Hence, the will’s activity can be directly and immediately about God himself, with no intervening middle term on the will’s part—but nevertheless, with many preceding middle terms on the intellect’s part, by which it comes to the knowledge of God.

Reply Obj. 1: Intellect is quicker to this extent, that it precedes affection [by giving it its object]; but in the act of loving, affection reaches more into a thing’s innermost being, as was said above.

Reply Obj. 2: Love must be of that which is somehow known and seen, but not necessarily of that which is known and seen directly. Hence that which is known in another can yet be loved directly.

Reply Obj. 3: A good is more lovable to the extent that it is more fully known—especially that good which is the end, and in which is found nothing offensive to affection. And therefore since God is more fully known in heaven than now, so he will be more fully loved. But that difference on the part of knowledge will be due to something proper to knowledge, namely, to know something per se, not in and through another; and accordingly there will not be the same ratio of knowledge [in heaven as in the wayfaring state]. There will be a difference in affection, however, not in regard to what pertains to it through itself, but rather due to the difference in knowledge. So, the nature of this love will remain the same, but the love will differ in its intensity, as the greater from the lesser.

Reply Obj. 4: The fact that love tends from visible to invisible things does not derive from something on its part, but rather from something on the part of knowledge, namely the kind of knowledge preceding it. Hence in each authority adduced mention was made of knowledge.

Reply Obj. 5: Neither the nature of the soul’s powers, nor that which follows upon them according to their nature, is taken away through sin.

Article 2

Whether God can be totally loved

To the second we proceed thus. (Parallels: ST II-II.27.5; De caritate, a. 10, ad 5.) It seems that God cannot be totally loved.

Obj. 1: For love presupposes knowledge, but God is not totally known, even by the saints in heaven. Therefore neither can he be totally loved by any creature.

Obj. 2: Further, just as the divine light is infinite, so also is the divine goodness. But by reason of its infinity the divine light cannot be comprehended by the intellect in such a way that it would be totally seen. Therefore neither can the divine goodness be totally comprehended by the affection in such a way that it would be totally loved.

Obj. 3: Further, God does not love himself more than totally. If therefore some creature could love God totally, some creature’s love would equal the divine love, which is false.

On the contrary, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart (Deut 6:5). This will be fulfilled, at least in heaven. Therefore God can be totally loved by man.

I answer that three things concur in the activity of loving, namely lover, love, and beloved; and to each of these corresponds its own mode. For a thing loved has a mode by which it is lovable, and the lover has a mode by which he is dilective, that is, apt to love something. But the mode of love is discerned in the comparison of lover to beloved, since love is the medium between the two. And it is similar in the case of vision.

If therefore “totally” be taken to refer to the mode of the thing loved and seen, in this way the saints in heaven love God totally and see him totally, since, just as there is nothing of his essence which they do not see and love (for which reason they are said to see the whole and love the whole ), so also nothing of the mode according to which God exists remains unseen or unloved by them. Hence they see and love totally, that is, they see and love the whole mode according to which God exists.

It is similar, too, if “totally” be taken to refer to the mode of the ones loving, since according to the whole mode [of their power to love and to see], that is, according to their whole capacity, they will love and see, nothing of their power being withdrawn from the divine vision and love. And in this way is understood “to love [God] from the whole heart.”

If, however, “totally” be taken to refer to the mode of the love, in this way they will neither totally love nor totally see, since the mode of love and of vision, as was said, is discerned in the comparison of the lovable and the visible to the one seeing [and loving]. Now the mode in which God is lovable and visible exceeds the mode by which man can love or see, since his light and his goodness is infinite. And therefore he is not totally seen and loved by others, since he is not loved as intensely and fervently, nor seen as clearly, as he is lovable and visible, except by himself. And thus he alone comprehends himself by loving and by seeing.

Reply Obj. 1–3: And from this repsonse, the solution to all the objections is clear.

Article 3

Whether the love by which we love God has any measure

To the third we proceed thus. (Parallels: ST II-II.27.6; De caritate, a. 2, ad 13; Super Rom. 12, lect. 1.) It seems that the love by which we love God has a measure.

Obj. 1: For every finite thing has a measure. But mode is caused by measure, as was said in Book I. (In I Sent., d. 3, q. 2, a. 2.) Since therefore the love by which we love God is finite, it must have a measure.

Obj. 2: Further, as Bernard says, charity progresses to wisdom. (In fact, William of Saint Theodore (Guillelmus abbas), De natura et dignitate amoris, ch. 2, para. 5 (P. Verdeyen, 2003, CCCM 88:181; PL 184:383).) But wisdom has a measure, according to Romans 12:3, do not be wiser than is necessary. (RSV renders this as “I bid every one among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think.”) Therefore love has a measure.

Obj. 3: Further, every act of virtue is moderate, since what is immoderate is reprehensible and vicious. But the love by which we love God is especially an act of virtue. Therefore it has a measure.

Obj. 4: Further, all the acts of the other virtues are done from charity. If therefore charity has no measure in its act, neither will the other virtues have a mode.

On the contrary, Bernard says in On Loving God, the reason to love God is God; the measure, to love without measure. (Bernard, Liber de diligendo Deo, ch. 1, n. 1 (Bernardi opera, ed. J. Leclercq et H.M. Rochais, 1963, vol. 3; PL 182:974).)

Furthermore, love ought to take its measure from the lovable thing. But the divine goodness is measureless. Therefore love of him has no measure.

I answer that “measure” indicates a certain measuring. But an act is measured by that which is the notion of the acting, just as mercy, in giving aid to one who experiences misery, takes its measure from the quantity of misery that moves the mercy.

Now, whereas the cause of loving God is the divine goodness, which is infinite, the act of a creature is finite, since it proceeds from a finite potency; and therefore it cannot be commensurate to the notion of the love. And owing to this, the love of God has no limit placed upon it beyond which it would be unnecessary to progress, but howsoever much this love should love him, it always stretches itself to what [still] lies before it. And for this reason, too, it is said that charity does not have a mode, namely, a pre-set mode, beyond which it must not progress.

Reply Obj. 1: Since the love by which we love God is finite, it has [as a matter of fact] a certain mode to which it attains [at any given moment]; but it does not have a mode according to which it stops or ought to stop, as have the other virtues.

Reply Obj. 2: As was said above, (Above, q. 1, a. 1.) that through knowledge things are in a certain way drawn into the one knowing; and therefore things pertaining to knowledge are measured by the knower’s own capacity, although the truth of the knowledge is measured by the thing itself. But through love the lover is drawn toward the very one loved, and therefore love is to be measured by the very thing loved rather than by the one loving.

Reply Obj. 3: No matter how much God is loved, the act will not be immoderate, since it does not exceed the proportion [befitting] to its object.

Reply Obj. 4: When it is stated that “charity has no measure,” we should understand the statement in regard to the act charity elicits, not in regard to the acts it commands, since those acts ought to receive modes in accordance with the various natures of their proper objects, concerning which those acts are done.

Article 4

Whether the mode of loving specified in the commandment can be fulfilled in the wayfaring state

To the fourth we proceed thus. (Parallels: ST II-II.44.6; De caritate, a. 10; De perfectione vitae spiritualis, cc. 4, 5.) It seems that the mode contained in the commandment can be fulfilled in the wayfaring state.

Obj. 1: For Jerome says, the one who says that God has commanded something impossible, let him be anathema. (Jerome, Dialogi contra Pelagianos libri iii, bk. 1, para. 14 (CCSL 80; PL 23:507–508).) But God commanded this [love the Lord your God with all your heart, etc.] to all wayfarers. Therefore it is heretical to say that it cannot be observed in the wayfaring state.

Obj. 2: Further, charity is a virtue more necessary than other virtues. But the commandments given about the acts of the other virtues can be fulfilled in the wayfaring state; therefore, too, the commandment given about the act of charity can be fulfilled.

Obj. 3: Further, every commandment of the law binds, since “law” (lex) is derived from “binding” (ligando). But no one may leave undone that to which he is bound, without incurring sin. If, therefore, the law were to command something that could not be done, it would kill—not only by furnishing an occasion for sinning, as the Apostle says, but also directly; and so it would be evil, which is unfitting.

On the contrary, as long as we remain in this life, we cannot be without sin, as is clear from 1 John 1:8. But whenever someone sins, he does not love God with his whole heart. Therefore that commandment cannot be totally fulfilled in the wayfaring state.

Furthermore, the heart of man cannot be occupied at the same time with many things. But while we are in this life we sometimes have to fix our hearts upon temporal things. Therefore man cannot love God in this life with his whole heart.

I answer that the whole and the perfect are the same, as the Philosopher says. (Aristotle, Metaphysics 10.4, 1055a12; Aquinas, In Metaph., bk. 10, lect. 5, n. 2028.) The notion of the perfect, however, consists in this: that nothing be lacking to it. But this happens in two ways: either (1) when something lacks nothing that it is capable of having, or (2) when something lacks nothing that it ought to have, just as someone is of the perfect quantity [of body] when he has such quantity as human nature requires, even if he does not have the quantity of a giant, which is nevertheless possible in human nature. Accordingly, (1) the first perfection of human nature is in the state of glory, when man will have the whole of what can possibly exist in human nature; but (2) the second perfection is of nature built up —namely, when a man has the whole of what he ought to have at a given time.

Following upon this distinction, a twofold totality in the love of God may be considered: (1) one, by which a man gives all to the love of God, in no way falling short of what is possible for him to give; and indeed, that this perfection or totality should be enacted is not commanded of us [in this life], but rather shown to us, in order that we might know the final state we shall come to, as Augustine says. (Sent. III, 27.6(101).2; citing Augustine, De perfectione iustitiae hominis, ch. 8, para. 19 (CSEL 42:7; PL 44:301).) And this perfection or totality excludes everything that would be able to interrupt the act of love, even for a time. (2) Another totality may be considered, by which a man withholds none of the things he ought to do for love of God, at some given time; and this perfection or totality is laid down in the commandment in such a way that even now it is meant to be fulfilled—namely, that a man should omit none of the things he ought to do for love of God. And this totality excludes everything that is contrary to it, as being repugnant to divine love—not, however, that which interrupts the act of love for a time, since always to act with the act of some virtue cannot happen except in those who are in the state of blessedness: for the perfection of the blessed consists in operation, whereas the perfection of the virtuous consists in habit.

Reply Obj. 1: What the law commands to be done can be fulfilled and is fulfilled by all in the state of salvation.

Reply Obj. 2: The acts of the other virtues are not the end of the commandment, as is the act of charity. The act of charity therefore has a mode which belongs in one way to the end and, in a different way, to the wayfaring state. It is not the same, however, with other virtues.

Reply Obj. 3: Insofar as charity is laid down as a commandment of the law, it binds us to whatever is to be fulfilled in the wayfaring state; whereas in regard to that which will be fulfilled of charity in heaven, it is laid down rather as an article of faith than a commandment of the law.

Reply Sed Contra: The solution to the contrary arguments is evident from what has been said.

Exposition of the text

And so [someone who does not love himself for the sake of God] does not love himself at all. (Sentences, III, 27.5(100).1, citing Augustine, On the Trinity, bk. 8, ch. 6, para. 9 (CCSL 50; PL 42:956).) But against this: Every sin, according to Augustine, (Augustine, The City of God, Bk. 14, ch. 28 (CCSL 48; PL 41:436).) comes from self-love. Therefore it seems that the evil man loves himself immoderately. In response, it should be said that what he loves in himself is his exterior nature, which he considers himself to be, but not the intellectual nature, according to which he truly is what he is. And so he loves what he reckons himself to be, but not what he truly is, since each thing is properly what is most powerful in it, just as the city is the king, as the Philosopher says in the Ethics 9. (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 9.8, 1168b31.)

The human mind, then, is made in such a way that at no time does it not remember, understand, and love itself. (Sent. III, 27.5(100).2, citing Augustine, On the Trinity, bk. 14, ch. 14, para. 18 (CCSL 50; PL 42:1049).) On the things mentioned in this statement, see the discussion in Book I. (In I Sent., d. 3, exposition of the text.)

'With your whole heart,' that is, with your whole intellect; 'with your whole soul,' that is, your will; 'with your whole mind,' that is, your memory. (Sent. III, 27.5(100).4.) It should be known that something is required for charity in three ways: (1) in one way, as the subject of charity, which is the will itself; (2) in another way, as something preceding charity, like memory and intelligence; (3) in a third way, as following upon charity, like the irascible and concupiscible, and also the bodily members that execute the command of charity. Since therefore the act of charity, even as the act of any virtue whatsoever, must be perfect, the commandment concerning the act of charity includes the perfection of all the powers mentioned, and all the commentators admit this, though they expound the text differently—namely, that neither in the will, nor in all the powers preceding or following the act of the will, should there be anything that resists charity, as far as perfection is possible in this earthly wayfaring, or anything that can interrupt its act when it has the perfection of heaven.

And thus, according to one explanation, the commandment is saying: with your whole mind, that is, with the whole memory, so that it is without forgetfulness; with your whole heart, that is, with the intellect, so that it is without error; with your whole soul, that is, with the will, so that every contrary affection might be removed. The same is explained in another way: with your whole heart, as regards the concupiscible and with your whole soul as regards the irascible, so that no passion of the sensitive appetite should impede the love of God; with your whole mind as regards the rational, which includes both will and intellect. Again, Gregory of Nyssa offers this explanation: with your whole heart, as regards the vegetative soul; with your whole soul, as regards the sensitive soul; with your whole mind, as regards the rational soul. (Gregory of Nyssa, De hominis opificio, ch. 8 (PG 44:143).) But in Deuteronomy 6:5 is also included with your whole strength, which is to be referred to the exterior members that carry out charity’s command; or it may be referred also to the irascible, as some say; or it may describe a characteristic of this love, namely, that it should be firm.